Moving, Allergies and the Chaos it Causes

So, my running kind of took a bit of a hiatus.

Between moving to a new house, and starting allergy injections to get immune to that which makes me sneezy, wheezy and itchy eyes, my running has definitely suffered.  The last two-three weeks there's been very little running.  This past weekend I was suppose to run 12 miles, but thanks to a hit on the head that caused me to black out, I wasn't in much shape for anything let alone running.

Today, I went out for an easy six mile run and it turned into three because of the allergies that are causing me problems.  Legs felt fine, but my lungs were not happy at all with it.  Saturday is my 25k. My goal distance for 2011.  I've decided in order to make this happen, I will skip a dosage of the allergy injection so that I'm clear of body and mind when it's time for that to happen.

I know for a fact I WILL complete the 15.5 miles.  It won't be a spectacular time, because of my set backs, but it will happen.  I just need to focus on the fact that I've killed 10 miles three times before not too long ago, and another 5 miles is nothing!  Especially since I will be doing 5/1s to get it done.

I do need to come up with a game plan for tomorrow, Friday and Saturday for nutrition so that I don't end up having problems because of that.  Shouldn't be too hard,  I know how my body reacts to foods and what I need to make it work well.  Then I just need to get my feet moving one in front of the other and I will be flying to my goal.

I just need to remember:

1. Limits are a fabrication of the mind.
2. Goals are dreams with a plan.

Not Slacking... Really!

Well, I've not been really slacking.  I have been getting my runs in.

I got my 12 miler done on Saturday with some good results.  Again, I was running 5/1s for it, and that averaged out to being 9:06 min miles.  So that is 30 second per mile faster than the 11 miles last week!

I then took out all my runs and averaged them, and that came out to 8:31 for 11.1 miles.  The walks were 14:42 for 1.25 miles.  So, yes I did run 12.35 miles total.  I felt not too bad after wards.  The legs were pretty tired but I probably could have done 15 miles if I really wanted to push it.  I would have paid for it worse than I am now with just the 12, but I could have done it!

That was Saturday morning.  Saturday evening, I went with the Texas Outrigger Canoe Club and helped paddled around Clear Lake for the Kemah Christmas Boat Parade.  We paddled for about 2.5 hours total and I think it was around 10-12 miles that we did.  Not sure for certain as my watch was turned off for about 1.5 hours.

So with those two workouts on Saturday I've been pretty sore and stiff all over from it.  Yesterday I also went in for my first allergy vaccination shot.  Since then I have been feeling like my allergies (cat/dog) have been trying to come through, but I think the allergy meds I'm taking are keeping it bay, so I'm in a weird state of being ready to be all sneezy, wheezy and eye itchy but it just not happening.

With that in mind, I went for another run yesterday afternoon.  Tired, sore and stiff from the Saturday fun, then allergyish from the shot... It felt like a big suffer fest out there.  And I felt super slow, but managed to do the 3 miles in just over 26 minutes so that wasn't too bad after all.

I have 5 miles planned tomorrow, so we shall see how that goes, shouldn't be too horrible as I will be running with a friend and that usually makes running much more tolerable.

So, I've not been slacking on my running, just slacking on my updates a bit...

Making Ten Miles My Bitch

This morning I once again broke through that ten mile barrier.

Today, I knew I could get past it, but I still had the little doubts in my head. "Ten miles is a long way, you sure you want to?"  Well, the 11.35 miles I did today, says "YES!"  I still worry about running ten miles, just not as much any more.  I ran it doing 5/1s, but does that mean I ran at leaset 10 miles today or did I walk some of it?  Well, turns out, I actually ran 10.09 miles today.  While the rest of it was walking.

The entire run took me 1:48:56, which happens to be 3 miles slower than I ran the 10.35 miles last week. Right off the bat, I not only ran further today, but ran quite a bit faster.  Average pace overall was 9:36.  My average pace during just my 5 minutes of runs, 9:03.  There was one 5 minute interval where my pace was 11::34 but that was because I stopped off at my truck and swapped out water bottles.  If I did not need to do that, then I would have had a sub 9 min average for the runs.  It is all about fast transition times!

I did try to push myself a bit today, to see how it would work out.  I wanted better time than I did last week, and I achieved that.  Also, with this week, my legs didn't start to feel much until mile 9.25.  So that's also a 1.5 mile improvement over last week.  I would say that my training is going well for me.  Just need to keep with it.   Next week is 12 miles.  I'm quite comfortable, sitting here with tired and achy legs, in saying that, 12 miles should not be an issue on Saturday at all.  I probably could have pushed that out today if I really wanted to, but no need in going beyond what is prescribed and possibly doing some damage that could harm the goal.

My legs now know what 10 miles of actual running is again.  They aren't hating me.  My head is in a good place right now. Over all, today was a good day for breaking mental barriers and pushing physical limits.  Reminds me of a quote I came up with many years ago when I first started getting into shape...

"Limitations are a fabrication of the mind"